Frequently Asked Questions

Yes. It would be great. The PC version comes first though, and then we will look at the demand for other platforms. If the game exceeds its target, then there will be scope to increase the number of platforms. We will discuss with the backers in the design discussion forum, and how to address the issues that will arise, but I have every hope that we will cover some or all of these platforms.

No, not in the sense that “Frontier” allowed you to travel huge distances in a short period of time. Instead we plan to use ‘local hyperspace’ travel. This is because time has to stay locked between the players (otherwise multiplayer doesn’t work).

No, it will be black, with a rich, realistic-looking star field and other background objects. The reason I had the background blue in “Frontier” was so that the planets could be seen as dark against a brighter background – but on some people’s screens it looked awful. It was supposed to reflect the rich mass of background stars.

No, not planned at least. It is a fun idea but it would destroy the beauty of the game, but if enough wanted it we could consider it as a special ‘cheat’ – as long as there wasn’t a gameplay benefit to those using it.

For those who get to name star systems or space stations, the name will be your choice, within reason. It does not have to be precisely your name – it could be your nickname or something else (within reason). So if your name were John Smith, it could be Smithworld, John Smith, Smithy’s Station, JS Station, and so on. Some have asked if it could be named after a relative who is no longer with us. All these things are possible. It should be something that isn’t offensive, or legally we cannot use without permission, or has some other problem (so if your name is Coca Cola, then maybe you might want to use your nickname!). If you are naming multiple systems, then we ask that you choose a different variant – so they are not identical. For the star systems there will be scope for a sentence, appearing on the system information in the game – for example “This system was first discovered by the famous explorer John Smith, who came from Paris, Texas, Earth”. This sentence should be no more than about twenty or so words, and should fit the character of the game, and will be agreed with you. If we cannot agree then a standard sentence (like the one given here) will be used.

Players will be able to communicate directly with each other. This has to be done instantaneously, otherwise we think it would be very frustrating. Space is truly huge, so an inter-system distance would mean delays of several years or more if we were being realistic!

You simply play the game, and depending on your configuration (your choice) some of the other ships you meet as you travel around are real players as opposed to computer-controlled ships. It may be a friend you have agreed to rendezvous with here, or it may be another real player you have encountered by chance. All players will be part of a “Pilot’s Federation” – that is how they are distinguished from non-players – so you will be able to tell who is a player and who is a non-player easily.

You will be able to save your position in certain key places (probably just in space stations, but possibly while in hyperspace too, if we feel it is needed). A save-and-quit option will be freely available at those points, as will the subsequent reload, but there will be a game cost for a reload following player death. Your ship will still be intact in the condition it was when the save occurred, but there will be a game currency charge (referred to as an insurance policy) for this. This is to prevent the obvious exploit of friends cooperating and killing each other to get each other’s cargo. If you can’t pay, then it will accumulate as an in-game debt, and the police may chase you!

There are no multiplayer lobbies, and the game will be played across many servers, augmented by peer-to-peer traffic for fast responses. Session creation and destruction happens during the long-range hyperspace countdown and hyperspace effect (which is a few seconds only), so is transparent to the player.

We have the concept of “groups”. They can be private groups just of your friends or open groups (that form part of the game) based on the play styles people prefer, and the rules in each can be different. Players will begin in the group “All” but can change groups at will, though it will be possible to be banned from groups due to antisocial behaviour, and you will only meet others in that group.

An obvious danger is an advanced player with a big well-armed ship in a busy system spends their time just picking off beginners, for fun.

To understand how this will be stopped requires a little bit of understanding how real player ships will be treated slightly differently to non-player ships. Players will automatically be part of a “Pilot’s Federation” and will be identified as such, together with their ranking and name. Bounties are paid by this Federation – something that is therefore much higher for those that kill other Federation members. It will be balanced so that this cannot be used as an exploit (so a beginner killing a beginner is taken less seriously than an Elite pilot killing a beginner – it will be based on the ranking difference).

There are four separate ways we will address this:

1. The offender will very quickly get a serious price on their head (bounty) and criminal record. That price on their head will attract bounty hunters.

2. Local police or military will respond very quickly and strongly to them.

3. It will be legitimate for other players to attack them for the attractive bounty without attracting a bounty for themselves, as once there is a bounty on their head they are officially a pirate and ‘free game’ for everyone.

4. If enough players complain about the offender's behaviour in a certain time, then they will be banned from this group.

“The Elite” are a secretive group of intrepid pilots. Throughout human space, there are a great many people that have been helped by “The Elite” over the years, and because of this “The Elite” are treated well, wherever they go. Whether it be discounts on buying special items or repairs, and the small number of founding members even greater benefits. Other benefits include a greater likelihood of being offered rare missions or opportunities. Membership is offered to pilots who have proven their ability by reaching “Elite” rating within the Pilot’s Federation, but the founding members are not put through such an indignity. All “The Elite” are entitled to display a special silver “Elite” emblem, and the founders a golden one with the word ‘Founder’ beneath it.

We do not plan to make it subscription-based. Once you have purchased the game up front, you will be able to play thereafter for no further cost. Everything in the game will be purchasable with in-game Credits, earned from trading, bounty-hunting, etc. We will probably allow the supplemental purchase of Credits with real money, for those who want to accelerate their progress through the game.

We do plan to charge for additional updates, to be available sometime after the original release. These will offer additional content, features and gameplay.

A huge number. You will trade in goods classes, but now we will have variants too – based on location of origin (creating a rarity factor based on distance away) and quality – so you might have Lavian Brandy in the category Liquor/Wine.

Yes. There will be both scripted and procedural missions. Some missions will be implied rather than explicitly signed up to – ie you will simply encounter something and you can choose to engage or not. An example of this is an incoming distress call or a derelict ship. They might be what they seem, or they might not…

Firstly, we are confident that we will reach the funding level. However, in the very unlikely event that the funding level is not met, at the end of the funding period we will be happy to make a deal outside Kickstarter for half the pledge level (ie £2,250), available to all those who have 'Writer's Pack' pledges at the end of the funding period, which will grant all the rights you need, and a license to use the relevant materials and imagery, so the book publishing can still go ahead. This should address the concern about a writer achieving funding via another route (eg from a publisher, or from another Kickstarter project), and ours not succeeding, leaving the potentially difficult situation where the writer cannot deliver on their promise.

The galaxy for Elite: Dangerous is a shared universe maintained by a central server. All of the meta data for the galaxy is shared between players. This includes the galaxy itself as well as transient information like economies. The aim here is that a player's actions will influence the development of the galaxy, without necessarily having to play multiplayer.

The other important aspect for us is that we can seed the galaxy with events, often these events will be triggered by player actions. With a living breathing galaxy players can discover new and interesting things long after they have started playing.

Update! The above is the intended single player experience. However it will be possible to have a single player game without connecting to the galaxy server. You won't get the features of the evolving galaxy (although we will investigate minimising those differences) and you probably won't be able to sync between server and non-server (again we'll investigate).

The main Kickstarter page has been updated to provide more information on pledge upgrades and gifting pledges. In essence if you increase your pledge by the correct amount you can duplicate a pledge. This does not apply to pledges that are limited in number, these require account for each pledge.

Postage fees are only for people that are outside the UK and are in two categories, the main pledges (eg a premium box etc ) and the pledge add ons (sound track, books etc). Pledge add ons for customers outside the UK will only attract a flat postage fee of £15 either for a single level (eg the soundtrack) or multiple level (eg the sound track and the signed book). If you ordered the premium box this is one of the main pledges and it attracts postage of £15, and if you ordered any add on on top of the main pledge this is another £15 even for multiple items. In summary, if you have a premium box *and* multiple add on pledges (sound track, signed book etc) then you will not pay postage of more than £30 if you are outside the UK

Yes, but not in the initial release. Our aim is to make planetary landings a much richer experience than ever before and that requires considerable development effort. To achieve this we'll focus on landing on planets after the initial release.

Yes, but not in the initial release. The core release of the game focusses on the ships and space. We'll then be working to expand the game. This includes exploring your ship and space stations. The potential content for Elite is huge,so we're keeping a sensible strategy to add to the game in stages.

There are no jump gates in ELite: Dangerous. Your ship is fitted with a hyper drive that allows you to jump to star systems in range of the engine. You can also use the drive to jump large distances within the star system.

Each star systems has its own collection of planets, moons and other bodies like asteroids. There are a large number of planets types from small and rocky to immense gas giants and all kinds between. Different systems also have different habitations like space and mining stations.